Generating Pastoral Skills through Work and Play in the Daily Life of Maasai Children in Kenya

Abstract

Pastoralists in East Africa are well known for their abilities in effective livestock and natural resource management in the dynamic arid and semi-arid ecosystem in which they live. Their ethnobiological knowledge, manifest in their skills of managing livestock and natural resources, is generated from the daily experiences of individuals in different landscapes. Since the early twentieth century, the pastoralist Maasai have gradually experienced land fragmentation and lifestyle changes. However, how Maasai children learn ethnobiological knowledge and how their learning processes are related to the local accessibility of their land remain largely unknown. Focusing on eleven children's daily activities during long school vacations in a Maasai village, where lands are still communally owned, this paper aims to understand the children's ethnobiological knowledge learning and its relation to access to land in current social contexts. The children independently undertake work, such as livestock herding and food preparation, as well as engaging in various play activities. With access to the land, they continue generating ethnobiological knowledge in different spatial and temporal contexts during work and play. The results of this study illustrate that access to the land plays important roles in current Maasai societies in terms of children's ethnobiological knowledge learning. The study also suggests the necessity for further investigation of the relationship between land use changes and the ethnobiological knowledge learning of children in different small-scale societies.

Short-term temporal analysis and children's knowledge of the composition of important medicinal plants: the structural core hypothesis

“…Empirical research also suggests that the prevalence of vertical transmission can be overestimated in self-reports about the learning model [ 57 ]. Moreover, because children learn a lot from other children, this indicates the importance of horizontal transmission in the formation of knowledge and child practice [ 61 ].…”

“There are No Trees Here”: Understanding Perceived Intergenerational Erosion of Traditional Medicinal Knowledge among Kenyan Purko Maasai in Narok District

“…As indicated by the literature (Barreau et al 2016; Iniesta-Arandia et al 2015; Mathez-Stiefel and Vandebroek 2012) and our results, immersion in the local environment and lived experiences with incidental traditional medicine is a factor in the transmission of knowledge. For many Maasai communities, learning traditional medicine was incorporated into daily life as chores (Tian 2018). Herders learned about herbs while out with cattle (Bruyere 2016; Trimarco 2016).…”

“…Now we go to the clinic or the hospital because we are in town. (39-year-old participant, 2018) Most of them use these herbs, or maybe if their parents are here in town then communities, learning traditional medicine was incorporated into daily life as chores (Tian 2018). Herders learned about herbs while out with cattle (Bruyere 2016;Trimarco 2016).…”

Exploring the links between household chores, learning, and mathematics performance in Zambia

“…In a Tanzanian case study including 57 households (mothers/female guardians) and 114 children, both mothers and children reported that more girls (aged 10-17) than boys of the same age engaged in collecting wood and fetching water, and that they spent more average hours than boys doing these necessary household tasks and that these hours often took place during the week (DeGraff et al, 2017). Gendered chore assignments are often culturally driven, as such social norms are perpetuated through the tradition of modeling and emulation in play and daily work; as one anthropologist noted, Maasai community members in southern Kenya would laugh if a boy carried firewood back home (Tian, 2019). There is also an economic aspect to such practices.…”